Rock, Paper, Scissors
by Abagail Snow
Summary: Vignettes of Peeta's family in his house at Victor's Village, from his brothers to his children.
1. Rock, Paper, Scissors

_AN This was my submission for Everlark Week (__**promptsinpanem **__on tumblr) the brother's names are derived from the Greek words for paper and scissors, since Peeta is derived from rock and at one point he was one (and since everyone does bread references and I'm hipster like that.) You should all go check out Everlark Week if you haven't already. _

**Rock, Paper, Scissor**

Peeta dropped another box onto the kitchen counter and pulled back the cardboard lid to check its contents. There wasn't much order to how the Capitol movers had packed his things. This box contained a few school supplies, a pair of sneakers, and a rolling pin. The last box contained only his winter jacket. No wonder there were so many boxes.

Peeta's eldest brother, Saleethi, came through the doors with two boxes hoisted easily on his shoulders. "Where do you want these?" he asked, but he didn't wait for an answer before he dropped them on the kitchen table.

"Is that the last of them?" Peeta asked.

"Cartee's got the rest," Saleethi said. Abandoning the boxes, he went to explore the kitchen. "So this is your new place, baby brother?"

"According to the papers," Peeta said with a nod.

"Does it have all those Capitol gadgets you were telling us about? Will machines deliver me food at my beck and call?" He picked up the telephone from the cradle and held it to his ear. "Prime rib. Mashed potatoes with sour cream." He paused to look about the room and frowned when his order didn't appear. "Must be broken," he said, hanging up the phone.

Peeta only rolled his eyes as he opened the next box to find a single frying pan.

"So, which room is mine?" his brother, Cartee said as he entered the room with the last stack of boxes.

"None of them," Peeta stated, and took the boxes from him.

Cartee placed his hands on his hips. "Katniss Everdeen is letting her mother and sister move in to _her_ house."

"Katniss' mother is a widow," Peeta explained, "and her sister is only twelve years old. You on the other hand are eighteen, and God love our mother, but she's Dad's problem, not mine."

"What are you going to do in this giant house all alone?" Saleethi asked, opening his arms wide to better eloquently display the size of the structure.

"I can think of a few things," Cartee said cheekily. "Especially now that his girl next door is to the exact likings of his absolute fantasies."

"Would you quit it?" Peeta said, feeling his face flush slightly. "It's not like that. And besides, she lives three doors down. You can barely even see her house from here."

"So you've looked then," Saleethi joined in on the teasing.

"No," Peeta said abruptly, trying to backtrack.

"He sits in his window every night crying her name," Cartee said. "Katniss!" he cried painfully.

"Shut up!" Peeta shouted and wrapped his arm around his brother's neck to trap him in a headlock.

Cartee struggled for only a second before he swiped Peeta's legs from beneath him, and had him pinned to the floor. "Oh little brother, don't you know by now that Cartee always beats Peeta?"

"Don't get so cocky, _little brother_," Saleethi said, hooking his arms under Cartee's to lock his shoulders before he lifted him off Peeta. "Saleethi will always beat Cartee."

The brothers wrestled across the kitchen floor, knocking over chairs and crashing into cabinets. They only stopped when they heard a delicate clearing of a woman's throat.

Peeta scrambled onto his belly as he looked up at the kitchen door that was still propped open. Katniss Everdeen stood at the threshold, her gray eyes curious and her rosy lips tilted into an amused grin.

"Katniss, hey," Peeta said as he climbed to his feet, pausing to adjust his tee shirt and calm his hair. "You've met my brothers."

She smiled and acknowledged them both before her attention returned to Peeta. "I brought some squirrels for your father," she said, holding up her game bag.

"You've been hunting?" Peeta asked, and silently chastised himself for sounding concerned.

She held up a finger to her lips as if to remind him that it was their little secret. Their's and all of Panem's really after her performance in the Games. She held the bag out to him and said, "I don't have much need to head into town, so I thought I'd leave them for you. I'm sure now with your winnings, there's no need to replace real meat with squirrel, but I wanted to show him my thanks."

"Some days I think he prefers fried squirrel to a leg of lamb," Saleethi said with a chuckle.

"He'll be grateful, thank you," Peeta added.

"Have you had our father's famous fried squirrel?" Cartee asked, now at Peeta's side with his arm thrown over his brother's shoulder. Katniss shook her head. "Well you must try it, after all those rodents you've snagged for us. Maybe you could come to dinner sometime."

Her eyes flitted to Peeta's hesitantly before dropping to her boots. "Maybe," she said, although from her tone, Peeta could tell she was only humoring them. "Well I'll let you get back to your…" she paused to look at the space of floor they were just wrestling on, "… unpacking."

With that, Katniss left, swinging the door behind her. Peeta stared at the sack of dead squirrel in his hand and frowned.

"She likes you," Saleethi said, giving Peeta a gentle pat on the shoulder.

"I don't know about that," he said, shaking off his brother's hand to throw the game bag into the icebox. "She pities me."

"When you pity someone you avoid them," Cartee reasoned. "You don't come up with excuses to see them."

Peeta looked out the window over the kitchen sink to watch Katniss make her way across the yard. She stopped where the grass met the gravel road of Victor's Village and turned back to face his house, her hand lifting above her brow to shield the sun from her eyes. Peeta wondered if she could see him through the pane glass window, and lifted his hand to wave. It took her a moment to respond, but soon she returned the gesture before hurrying off.

"You may be no good at wrestling," Cartee said, joining him at the window. "But when it comes to matters of the heart, Peeta always wins."


	2. The Wrestling Rematch

_AN This is not a continuation, rather, the latest Everlark Week prompt provided symmetry to the first part, so I figured I'd post then together instead of as a second one parter. Thank you for all the reviews for the first part! I've never had much interest in the other Mellark boys (part of this being because Peeta didn't seem too attached to them) but it was fun to write brotherly banter. Now I take a crack at writing the yoingins..._

**The Wrestling Rematch**

Katniss dusted the counter with a fresh layer of flour before she dropped the ball of dough onto it. She took another pinch of flour from the canister, just enough to cover the shiny dough, and sprinkled it over her mixture. Peeta Mellark wasn't the only member of the household who could bake, and in the twenty years she had known him (truly known him) she had picked up enough skills to prepare a simple loaf of bread.

She kneaded the dough, only sparing more flour when absolutely necessary, until it was a perfectly round pearl. She smiled, content, and swiped a hand across her forehead to brush away the strands of hair that escaped her braid.

She felt a warm body press behind her as she worked, and watched as a pair of thick fingers pinched into her dough. She slapped the hand away playfully.

"It's not done," Peeta said, his lips teasing the shell of her ear.

"It is too," she said, using her elbow to push him from her work. "I've kneaded it twenty times, and it's holding its shape perfectly."

He poked his finger into it again and the glob deflated. "It's all right," he said with a chuckle. "You don't have to be good at everything."

"I am not!" she said, her jaw agape as she turned to face him. She could think of nearly a thousand things she was no good at. She couldn't cook, she could barely string three words together, and she wasn't affable, or comforting, or nearly as compassionate as she could be.

"Stop," Peeta said, his eyes peering into hers as if he were reading every emotion off her face like words on a page. "You raised your sister on your own, you nurtured me back to life in the woods with only a handful of leaves and some spit…"

"I think it was mostly the Capitol grade antibiotics," she said.

He rolled his eyes. "You led a revolution with a bow and arrow," he continued. "Trust me, you're good at everything. I've exhausted the better part of my life admiring how good you are at everything you do."

"You don't have to flatter me," she said. "It's fine if there are some things in life that you're better at. You bake. I hunt. We have a deal, remember?"

"You're perfectly good at baking," he said, pinching a bit of dough from the ball to pop into his mouth.

"Fine," she said, secretly pleased with herself. "You'll always be the better wrestler then."

"Second best in District Twelve," he said proudly, but his grin turned bittersweet and he dropped his chin to his chest. "First I mean, although by default…" he trailed off, and chuckled in that way he did to lighten the mood even though his heart was breaking. "It's been years since that match, I doubt it carries much weight."

"You were quite good," she said, touching her hand to his cheek so that he would look at her again.

He smiled, his eyes glistening with unshed tears for his dear brother. "Did you actually go to that match?" he asked.

"I did," she said.

She wasn't overly interested in the sport, but when she had heard that Peeta Mellark was participating in the District Championship, she felt compelled to attend. He had taken the time to support her during her time of need, and it seemed like the least she could do to support him. And so, when Madge Undersee had mentioned at lunch that her father was forcing her to attend all school events, including the afternoon's "stupid wrestling tournament," Katniss had immediately volunteered to join her.

She remembered him in his wrestling uniform, and the way it outlined every muscle rather prolifically. So much so that she found herself staring at parts of him that a girl with virtue never would. She couldn't help it though and was mesmerized with the way that each muscle contracted over his back and arms and legs with every hold. She hardly understood when Peeta's brother, Cartee was declared the winner, when Peeta looked so good – performed so well.

She felt her face flush at the memory. "You were quite handsome in your uniform," she said brazenly.

"You thought I was cute?" He teased, his grin genuine this time.

"No," she said flatly. "I don't find you attractive at all. Why else would I have married you and bore two of your children?"

"Admit it," he said, and his arms wrapped around her and trapped her against him. She giggled as she tried to wriggle free, but he was too strong, and she didn't _really_ want to be released from his grasp.

She freed her arms and locked one of her elbows around his neck to trap him in a hold. "Maybe you aren't the best wrestler in District Twelve," she said, delighted at getting the upper hand.

His arm tightened around her waist and he hoisted her over his shoulder easily, like he used to with all those sacks of flour at the bakery. He carried her to the couch where he deposited her, pinning her against the cushions with his thighs, while his fingers moved to her sides to tickle her. "Admit it," he said again through his own fits of laughter.

"I want to play!" their daughter, Scarlett shouted as she bound down the steps, her thin brown braid whipping dangerously behind her in her wake. With all the might her little legs could muster, she hurled herself onto her father's shoulders to tickle him with skinny little fingers.

Peeta turned to tickle the little girl's round belly, while Katniss scrambled free, allowing their daughter the opportunity to get the upper hand.

"Perhaps I'm not the best wrestler in the district," he relented, rolling onto his back so that Scarlett could pin him. She grinned a gap toothed smile, when her father held his arms up in surrender. "I'll have to settle with second, I suppose."

"I have another challenger who says otherwise," Katniss said, lifting their son, Hunter from his playpen. The little toddler wildly flapped his arms in anticipation, before Katniss set him gently next to his sister, on his father's chest. Hunter rolled onto his stomach and tried to tickle Peeta with his chubby little fingers, but was only successful in smearing a concoction of drool and snot over the collar of his shirt.

Peeta ruffled his son's blond mop of curls. "Fine, third," he said, and looked up at his wife. "Unless you'd like a rematch."

Katniss admired the joy on her husband's face as he wrestled with their children. That he could find an activity tied so closely with the extreme loss of his family, yet find something so wonderful and beautiful within it. She only wished she had half of his strength. And on some days, like today, she thought maybe one day she could.

Katniss folded her arms across her chest. "I could take you."

"That can be arranged," he said with the type of wink that made her cheeks flush. Her eyes appraised him like the day of that wrestling match, all those years ago, and she smiled.

She scooped Hunter off of Peeta's chest and carried him towards the stairs announcing:

"Kids it's time for bed."


End file.
